Gen X Design | Ian Selby

All Things Web 2.0

Archive for March, 2008

Cool video I found digging through all my old posts… still a good watch:
Video at YouTube

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  • Filed under: Asides
  • Being that I just started my new job at Aptana, one of the first things they asked me to do is learn everything I can about Jaxer and to document that process. For those of you who don’t know yet, Jaxer is essentially and AJAX server. The very long story short is that you now have the ability to run JavaScript on the server-side (no more cross-site restrictions!), and along with that ability you get some pretty kick-ass API functionality that isn’t normally an inherent part of JS (such as built-in filesystem or database functionality). Essentially, you can now write the better part, if not all of your web apps in JavaScript. What’s even cooler is that you don’t need to give up the technologies that you currently use in order to implement Jaxer. I’ll be writing on how you can blend all these new and existing technologies in the near future (perhaps even make my screen-casting debut), but for now I want to talk about how to get Jaxer set up with an existing Apache install, specifically an XAMPP-based development environment.

    Granted you can download a stand-alone Jaxer+Apache bundle, but if you’re like me, you want to be able to start seeing how it plays with existing web technologies (for me, that would be PHP). The other thing that you’ve probably already got (if you’re like me) is a test / development environment locally, and it’s most likely XAMPP (or something similar). Finally, if you’re slightly OCD like me, you like to have everything in one place, all nice and organized. Well, you’re in luck, because I’m going to show you how to get all of this goodness up and running. My examples will be for a Mac install of XAMPP, but the Windows / Linux methods will be pretty darned close. The only caveat with this walk-through is that it is written based on the upcoming 0.9.5 release (which will be out within the next week or so), and this is because it covers some important changes from the 0.9.4 releases. Now that we’ve got all that out of the way, let’s get into how we can get all this up and running. Read on…
    (more…)

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  • Filed under: Jaxer
  • From Ajaxian - While this is not strictly Ajax or JavaScript related, it is noteworthy to point out that Sitepoint just released a HTML reference that is quite handy to have around if you wonder if what you are building is really HTML or just tagsoup.
    Sitepoint HTML Reference

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  • 35 Fantastic HDR Pictures

    Some really good stuff, worth a quick glance. HDR is High Dymanic Range, a post-processing technique that, when done right, yields some really awesome results.
    www.smashingmagazine.com

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  • If you were to take a look at my resume, you’d probably wonder why anybody would hire me… In the past three years I’ve had 4 jobs. Luckily for me, every job I left, I left for a good reason, and I could explain those reasons to the satisfaction of the next employer. But I’m not writing this to talk bad about previous employers, but rather to share a little of the knowledge I’ve gathered along the way (and supplement that with other people’s of course). Of course, this is all mostly relevant to development jobs, but I’m sure other people could take from this what they will.

    Reasons My Jobs Sucked

    There’s a lot of nit-picky things I could say here, but I won’t, I’d rather stick to the broad topics…
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    See Me @ AjaxWorld '08 West

    AJAX RIA - Server-Side JavaScript - All the Cool Kids Are Doing It!

    PhotoStream

      What do You do?  I'm a Web DesignerGriffin Playing in Alamo SquareThe Painted Ladies, and the City in the BackgroundThe Painted LadiesMore Golden Gate Bridge GoodnessAlcatraz IslandThe Golden GateGive Mommy KissMommy & Griffin Playing at Crissy Field

    Asides

    • Firebug Lite 1.2 Released

      If you've ever used Firebug for JS development, you know how indisposable it is. If you haven't, you're insane, and you need to start using it now! Firebug Lite was created to be able to embed a more limited version of the library in non-firefox browsers. Previously, you couldn't do much with it outside of the console. functions and use a JS command-line. Looks like that's a thing of the past with the new release. It's pretty much as functional as the actual Firefox extension, and is well worth checking out:
      Firebug Lite 1.2 Released (via Ajaxian)

    • BgPatterns.com - Cool Background Image Generator

      While its generally not my style, I would have loved to have something like this several times in the past. Slick, easy, classy, fun, and actually worthwhile. Check it out:
      www.bgpatterns.com

    • savethedevlopers.org - Save a Developer. Upgrade Your Browser

      "Say No To IE 6!
      Our current campaign focuses on assisting users in upgrading their Internet Explorer 6 web browser. This campaign will result in former IE 6 users having a more enjoyable experience on the web while (hopefully) creating a less stressful and complicated environment for web developers by hastening the retirement of an outdated browser."

      http://www.savethedevelopers.org/

    • Evernote - Awesome Note Capturing Software

      I know, yet another note capture / organize program... but this one's different. It's got really powerful OCR software (it will pull text from images, even handwriting) that automatically finds words in your images and indexes them, making it easier to find later. Works on the web, your mobile phone, and PC or Mac. Best of all, it's free!
      Evernote - Capture. Sync. Find

    • Magic Toolbox - High Quality JS Tools

      Nice little suite of JS tools... they're commercial, but reasonably priced. The names kinda imply what they do: Magic Zoom, Magnify, and Thumbs. Definitely worth a look:
      Magic Toolbox

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    About Me

    Gen X Design has been my freelance development and design company for some time now, and my services are sometimes available.

    Recently, I've been too wrapped up in work to pursue my own interests. To that end, I've made some changes in my life, re-worked this site so I'm happy with it again, and have decided to get back to writing and developing.

    I have a passion for all things Web 2.0, love shiny icons and gradients, and live in the San Francisco Bay area. I work for Aptana.